THE only thing worse than poetry read aloud on screen is having to watch actors talk about “the process.”

In the press notes, director, writer and star Michael Pressman calls “Frankie and Johnny Are Married” – a re-enactment of the real-life headache he and his actress wife Lisa Chess endured in putting on a play – “cathartic” and “healing.”

That’s great for him. But there’s little that’s particularly dramatic or funny for the outsider in this autobiographical vanity project.

Chess and Pressman, a TV director with “Chicago Hope” and “The Practice” to his credit, have never worked together.

With the intention of energizing their 10-year marriage and giving struggling actress Chess a well-deserved break, they decide to plow their own money into mounting a Los Angeles production of Terrence McNally’s two-character play, “Frankie and Johnny in the Clair de Lune.”

Chaos ensues as the equity-waiver production starts hemorrhaging money, the inept producer makes mistake after mistake and the arrogant, volatile actor playing Johnny (TV actor Alan Rosenberg ostensibly playing himself) sabotages the show.

Pressman steps in to the role of Johnny, but he’s no actor – he’s not even very convincing playing himself, and he’s eclipsed by Chess, who is truly talented (both as herself and the world-weary Frankie).

The couple have some nice romantic moments that give the proceedings a lift, but the film – in which Hollywood players such as David E. Kelley, Mandy Patinkin and Les Moonves appear as themselves – is too inside baseball for most casual moviegoers.

There’s also plenty of obnoxious name-dropping. Characters lob references to Michelle (as in Pfeiffer) and Al (as in Pacino), which only serves to remind viewers they’d be better off renting their 1991 film “Frankie and Johnny” than watching this glorified home video.